Seer of Blood
by psYchOtIc Summoner
Summary: Everyone has an angel. A guardian who watches over us. We can't know what form they'll take. But don't let appearances fool you, they can be as fierce as any dragon. Yet they're not here to fight our battles, but to whisper from our heart. Reminding that it's us. It's every one of us who holds power over the world we create. SuckerPunchstuck. I own nothing.
1. Sweet Dreams Are Made of This

Thunder rumbled outside the manor, and a young adult sat on his bed, hugging his knees to his chest. He trembled, trying to calm his racing heart. He heard a knock at the door and jolted, snapping to attention. A woman with dark hair and a grim look entered the room. Before he could open his mouth, the woman looked down, shaking her head. The boy's eyes widened in pure horror, and he sprang to his feet, pushing past the woman.

He ran as fast as he could to the door at the end of the hall, where nurses and a doctor stood, also bowing their heads. He skidded to a stop at the foot of the bed, his shoulders slumping at the sight. A smaller boy, his younger brother, ran in moments after. The younger child screamed at the sight and his brother had to restrain him in his fit of grief.

"Dad! DAD! DAD, WAKE UP! GOD FUCKING DAMN IT, LET ME GO! LET ME GO YOU FUCKING SHITSPONGE! KANKRI, LET ME FUCKING GO! _LET ME GO, DAMN IT! DAD, PLEASE GET UP! __**WAKE UP!**_ _**DAD!**_"

"Karkat. Karkat, it's going to be okay. I got you. I got—"

"SHUT UP! JUST SHUT THE FUCK UP! DAD! DAD, please…Dad…" Karkat's voice died down, and he dissolved into hysterics, almost choking on his sobs. Kankri could only hold his brother close, rubbing small circles into his back and swaying in an attempt to soothe him. Karkat's tears stained his sweater, but he didn't mind; tears were not sinful.

An ominous, slightly heavy sound of footsteps sounded behind them, and Kankri knew instantly who it was. He looked up to meet the face of his stepmother, Condie, who had entered the room shortly after Karkat. She strode silently over to the bedside, peered at the still, graying body, then pulled the white sheet up to cover the face of Karmin Vantas. Kankri snuck a glance at Condie's eyes, and tensed up at what he saw. There was no grief, despair, or even anger. There was only _pleasure_. Devious pleasure.

The funeral was lovely, in a macabre sense. Rain clouds blacked out the sky, and the guests, who included friends and immediate family of the Vantases, were all dressed in their finest black ensembles for the occasion. Instead of joining his friends, Karkat merely chose to cling to his brother, the latter holding an umbrella above them. Two of Karkat's friends stood by him, a somber and pitiful feeling prominent in their expressions. Karkat dropped his rose into the open grave mere seconds before the pallbearers began to fill it with dark, moist earth. When the service ended and the coffin was completely buried, Karkat, Kankri, and Condie were the only three left at the cemetery. When asked, Karkat elected to return to his home rather than attend the bar festivities, and as driven home by Kankri. Condie opted to go to the bar.

It stormed again that night, and Karkat fell asleep late. He refused to sleep without his "dumbass brother there so he could make sure he didn't die or pull any dumbass stunts". Kankri was slightly concerned by his antics, but he understood the smaller boy's situation. Karmin's death had taken a heavy toll on everyone in the household, having sparked a strong sense of camaraderie with almost everyone he met. Condie was of no help, having locked herself away in the study since returning from the bar. Kankri could only imagine what she might be up to.

When Karkat had finally fallen asleep, Kankri left the room as quietly as he could. He left the door open a crack, just the way his dad would, and turned to enter his room. He was stopped by a figure in the corner of his eye that seemed to be a person. That couldn't be right; Condie had given the staff the weekend off. They weren't live-in staff.

Upon closer inspection, Kankri found that the figure was a person. It was Condie, and she had murder spelled out on her face in bold, bright red letters. At the sight of the butcher's knife in her right hand, Kankri turned on his toes and ran like hell. He had just about slammed his door when she lunged. He fought with all his strength to shut her out, and she reached a hand that almost looked like a demonic claw in the dim light through the crack between the door and the doorframe. Condie grabbed him by the collar of his nightshirt, managing to rip the top three buttons open and sending them plummeting to the ground. With a heavy shove, she sent the door flying open—almost completely off its hinges—and Kankri hit the ground. He began to scramble backwards, the sheer adrenaline pumping through his veins allowing him to shake off the double impact. He caught a glimpse of Karkat racing down the hallway towards their father's now unoccupied bedroom. His footsteps caught Condie's attention, putting Kankri on the back burner.

Kankri tried frantically to get to her, but he was too late. Condie slammed the door shut and locked it, deciding to go after Karkat instead. Kankri fumbled with the door handle and peered through the keyhole, before accepting that the door was no longer a usable exit. A near-blinding flash of lightning illuminated the room, and Kankri was struck by an incredibly risky but certainly doable idea. The gutter ran down from the roof, along the wall, down to the ground below. From Kankri's third floor bedroom, that would be an almost thirty foot drop. However, the gutter ran a little over a foot away from his window. In an act of desperation, he pushed the window open and reached over as far as he could, nearly slipping in the process.

Meanwhile, Karkat was curled up in the back of his father's closet, clutching one of his father's sickles to his chest. The bedroom door hadn't held Condie back, and she was now pounding on the closet door. "_Please, don't let her get in, oh God_" he silently prayed, the lock on the door coming close to breaking. How insanely strong _was_ that woman? "Kankri…where are you?" he whispered. It was all he could do to keep from panicking completely.

Kankri, having almost lost his grip on the gutter three times, was finally near the ground. To speed things up, he let go of the gutter and fell the remaining six feet. He landed in a marshy part of the grass, muddy water soaking his legs. He ignored the chill of the wind against his rain-soaked body and made a beeline for the nearest entry.

Karkat pressed himself into the darkest corner of the closet possible, crunching up as small as he could, and suppressed a scream with every strand of willpower he could muster when Condie finally broke through, busting the door open with a giant kitchen knife. It was all for naught; she knew where he was and pinpointed his location in the closet. She flipped the light switch, and light flooded the dark closet. Being raised to never give up, Karkat rose to his feet, brandishing the sickle. He would fight for all he was worth. An ominous "click" behind Condie grabbed both of their attention. Condie turned around to see Kankri, soaking wet and terrified, holding a handgun.

"You dun' know how to use that, boy. Just put it down, sweetheart." Condie cooed in a sickly sweet version of her voice that usually sounded like she came straight from a ghetto. While he didn't know what kind of gun he was using, or how much recoil he'd get, he did indeed know how to use it. Kankri lifted the gun in response, aimed at Condie, and pulled the trigger.

_**BANG!**_

_**THUMP!**_

_**KISSSHHH!**_

Kankri winced and bowed his head at the sounds. He heard a groan from Condie immediately after, and he hoped for the best. He'd hit her, left her unable to move adequately, and would be able to charge her with attempted murder. But where was Karkat's voice? He should have been able to hear Karkat at least _breathing_. Slowly, cautiously, Kankri opened one of his eyes, then the other. Tears filled his eyes at the sight.

He'd hit Condie, but it was a minor graze. The knife lay on the floor; Kankri assumed she had dropped it in surprise. Somewhere along the line, the bullet had hit the light bulb, possibly ricocheting off of her obnoxiously heavy jewelry, and disappeared. Karkat was slumped on the ground, a spray of blood apparent on the wall behind him. He ran to his brother's side and lifted him, begging for him to wake up. His efforts were futile; Karkat was dead. The tears in Kankri's eyes finally began to run, but Condie's voice was the last straw.

"..he still has the gun…yeh...yeh, his lil' bruh's dead. He—"

She cut off her thought and dropped the phone, raising her hands in surrender when Kankri ran over to her, prepared to kill. His hands shook, and he dropped the gun, running once again, only this time was away from the house. He couldn't do it. He just couldn't do it. He tried to tell himself it was just a nightmare, it was just a horrible nightmare, and he would wake up with his father and Karkat waiting for him in the morning.

The storm had lightened to a mere drizzle with occasional booms of thunder in the distance. Kankri found himself at the cemetery in only an hour, and he stood by his father's grave, still a mound of dirt where the hole had been filled and covered with seeds. The fact that Kankri had run there without even thinking about it was a grim reminder that it wasn't a dream. This was real, and his only immediate biological family left was dead, by his own hands no less. The tears escalated into quiet sobs, and Kankri fell to his knees in defeat. He was a killer. He'd gone against everything he believed, everything his father had preached, and everything he'd ever rambled on about to his friends, Karkat, and even a few of Karkat's friends. He'd made many mistakes before, but this one would permanently stain his soul.

By daybreak, the police had tracked him down, accompanied by Condie herself. Kankri was stagnant and silent when the police lifted him from the ground. He refused to look up or stir from his apparent trance even as he was injected with was he assumed was a tranquilizer. He allowed himself to be picked up and placed in what felt like a car, and gladly gave in to the numbing black. Before he lost consciousness completely, he feared what he might wake up to, and prayed for everything to end. His final thought before he fell asleep consisted of, "_I wonder if other killers have felt like this._" That, of course, was absurd. Other killers were sociopaths, and Kankri was no sociopath.


	2. Where is My Mind?

When Kankri awoke, he found himself still in the car. The door opened, and Kankri's arms were roughly grabbed by two men in white uniforms. They pulled him out of the car and walked him to the building. One look was all it took for Kankri to realize that this was no police station he was being taken to. Struggling, Kankri tried to fight the men holding him, but the sedative had not yet worn off, leaving him weak. He stumbled and fell to the cold, damp cement, and was lifted by the arms again, still headed towards the building. The grand double doors opened with a loud _**creeeeaaaaak**_, instilling a sense of fear in Kankri.

The front of the building held little more than a receptionist with an odd lighter and a name tag reading "Droog", and a steel door with a single, barred window that Kankri could barely see through at his height. Behind the receptionist was a map of the facility labeled "LENNOX HOUSE". The smaller print read "For the Mentally Insane". Kankri's fear and curiosity were once again drowned in defeat. There was no getting out of an asylum, unless the legal guardian of the patient sued for release. One look at Condie confirmed that there was no chance of Kankri's release any time soon.

Condie received a clipboard with paper on it and a pen from the receptionist, and the receptionist knocked on the glass surrounding his office twice with his lighter. A buzzing noise sounded shortly after, the lock clicking open and allowing entry to Condie, Kankri, and the two men who Kankri figured were orderlies. Once more, Kankri nearly tripped over his feet as he was forced through the door. This occurred once more, this time with a key instead of a receptionist, and Kankri decided to walk himself this time. He was handed a set of clothes to change into, and sent to follow a man who looked like another orderly to yet another set of double doors. "_How many doors are there?!_" Kankri asked himself mentally.

Behind these doors was what looked like a cafeteria with a stage. In the front of the room, a pair of girls began screaming and cackling maniacally at each other, then the table was flipped and they were upon each other. Orderlies quickly stepped in to break it up, and Kankri looked away. The stage was set up like a bedroom, with a tall male on the bed. He had a Mohawk and either had a nice tan or was naturally Latino. Kankri connected eyes with him for only a moment before the orderly began speaking.

"So, you're Kankri?" He nodded slowly, looking like a deer in the headlights. "You listen to me now, okay? You do as I say, and we'll be good." Kankri could only whisper, "Who are you?"

"They call me Spades, but you refer to me as Mr. Slick, alright?" Mr. Slick. To Kankri, that sounded like a bad pickup line. When he only got a stare in response, Slick continued. "You stay put until I get back, we clear?" Kankri nodded once more, the motion beginning to feel automatic. Slick walked away to where Condie was waiting with the clipboard and pen, looking a bit impatient. Kankri could only hear bits and pieces of their conversation, but each tidbit made his chest tighten in panic.

"I want him…lobotomy…procedure…"

"We don't have…however, we do have a surgeon coming in at the end of the week. We should be able to schedule it for him…"

Kankri suppressed the tears as he'd been raised to do. This was no time to be crying. He had to do as much as he could to get the truth to the authorities, a psychiatrist, _someone_. He sighed internally, wondering what to do. If he was lobotomized, Condie would get away with trying to kill him and Karkat, alongside God only knew what or who else. Kankri decided to take the time to observe his fellow patients.

To his left was a table of three. They seemed to be about his age, perhaps a bit older. They stared him down with menacing gazes, then returned to what looked like a card game. Kankri knew then he wasn't welcome, and decided to stay on his toes. The male on the stage, on the other hand…he seemed to draw Kankri in with his eyes alone. Those chocolate brown eyes seemed to ask for something. Help, perhaps? Kankri elected to speak to him later.

Eventually, Condie left, and Slick took the forms elsewhere, a key on a necklace chain bouncing in time with his steps. Kankri took a seat at an empty table in the "theatre", and waited until he was taken to his room, where he changed into the clothes provided. When they walked past the kitchen, Kankri noticed that the cook had several knives in his belt. "_Better not get on his bad side._" Kankri made a mental note. He had his first therapy session that day with the psychiatrist Doctor Dolorosa, or "Miss Rosa", as she let her patients call her. He could only lay there for the hour, listening to the calming tick of the metronome. It wasn't until that night that Kankri let himself despair for the first time since he was a child. The tears freely dripped down his cheeks, and he wished desperately for a sweater to cuddle in. The clothes he was given weren't doing much good. He dried his tears after a while, and allowed the gears in his mind to turn. He was formulating a plan, a plan that just might help him escape. It was risky, it was partly asinine, it might not even work, but it had a fighting chance, and that was all Kankri needed.

In time, the week passed, and the surgeon came. Kankri found himself strapped to a chair behind a white curtain. He wondered what Condie was doing; she was probably screwing with her daughters, trying to get them to live with her. Nurses stood by as the doctor prepared the tools. Kankri knew that this was the end, that he could do nothing to change his fate. The long, needle-like utensil was lifted to his eye, and the hammer was poised to strike. He met eyes with the doctor before he allowed himself to slip away, where he knew he would be safe from reality. He was terrified, but he was relieved.

"Stop."


End file.
